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Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
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Very intirguing movie. Nice piece of celluloid.
The stellar cast by itself would be enough to spice one's curiosity. Come on, Fraser, Garcia, Gellar, Whitaker, Bacon, Delpy, Hirsch... It's unresistible.
But, as the saying goes, the road to hell is full of good intentions, and this low-budget project could be a catastrophe. But it is not. The movie is farily good, captivating. All the actors involved give solid performances, no matter how much screen time they got.
Good movie.
Rating: -
Emotions like waves are constantly in flux...
The Air I Breathe is a movie of the entangled lives genre, similar to Crash in that respect, and it also conforms by way of gratuitous violence and strip clubs it gladly flaunts. But that is not to say that the narrative lacks depth or emotional layers. The viewer becomes acquainted with three lives that will intertwine so as to lend freedom to a fourth in four vignettes titled: Happiness, Pleasure, Sorrow and Love. These characters, respectively played by Forest Whitaker, the disgruntled Wall Street clerk turned bank robber and suicidal sociopath; Brendan Fraser, a reticent hitman who seems to have lost his ability to predict the future as he decides to forsake fealty to his heartless crime lord (Andy Garcia); Kevin Bacon, a doctor who saves the life of Trista, a persecuted pop-star, and is thereby enabled to save from a snake bite his best-friend's wife (Julie Delpy), with whom he also happens to be secretly in love; and Sarah Michelle Gellar's pop tart, Trista, who becomes entangled favourably by the three lives but will lose everything in the while, love, career, and friends.
This is the debut feature by Jieho Lee, a Korean-American director and screenwriter who wrote this script as a reflection to his journey in a "bimodal world". The cinematography is well suited by the description of bimodal, as the colors are very stark but a terrifying chiaroscuro breathes the presence of a dual tone universe which seems to preface the destiny we all have set out for us, but not independently of others. The acting is mediocre, but for the outstanding consummate performance of Andy Garcia, who seems to be getting better with time and roles, and the flaky, horned-up supercilious nephew of Garcia's role played by Emile Hirsch.
The movie bounces along several themes but seems to defragment a somber reality where death and debts seem to frustrate everyone who has a heart, and where life is held hostage by forces that threaten us at all times, from every angle.
The congruence of themes is intriguing but the direction fails to fully represent this enigma in ways that portray the meaningful (or lack thereof) essence of life, aside from the role of coincidence. It seems to have no meaning save for being a yarn tangled and reeled compact. Ultimately however the violence seems to be overbearing and inopportune to portray the pain of ordinary lives and extraordinary men, some of which inexplicably have the advantage to foresee the future. This last aspect of the movie is very clearly a deus ex machina, which functions effectively as a means to allegorize destiny, but it does not fit with the pragmatics of the narrative's realist outlook. I fault the writing for that, whereas it was clearly insightful by other turns. There are deaths upon deaths and several cars slamming into people. A practice which I've yet to see done as well as in the Mexican movie Amores Perros, which was also about debts.
Herein I think much of the movie fails as well: the restraint it practices in regards to theme of debts, as was the case with the theme of destiny. I enjoyed the movie and it does hold you riveted to the screen thanks to stories that intersect and diverge only to meet into the future of one pop-star who is running away from her past and her present. It could have been better, but it deserves to be viewed.
A movie with a lot of questions, too bad it does not know how to ask them...
Rating: 
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great actors
i watched this film mainly for the actors sarah michelle gellar,kevin bacon,brendan fraser, have to say it was a very weird story line 4 different story going at the same time and then they all link together,i think i would of liked to have seen more
Rating: 
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Before the Bullet Enters
Jieho Lee's first feature fell flat for me, winding up a chore to finish before the video return deadline. Brendan Fraser who is currently in another "Mummy" movie does a decent job as the love-struck hitman. I don't know why his name is Pleasure other than he gets to be intimate with Sorrow before Pleasure is whacked. Sarah Michelle Gellar, fresh from her Golden Globe nomination for TV's "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" eight years ago, plays Sorrow, a rock star also named Trista. She's not actually a very good rock star, but she thinks she is. I wouldn't have bought her CD. She becomes even more sorrowful when her contract is forced into the hands of con-man Fingers played gruffly by Andy Garcia. Kevin Bacon who is in "Frost/Nixon" plays Love, a doctor who loves a doomed researcher named Gina played by the lovely Julie Delphy. Watching Delphy's hospital deathbed scene was the highlight of this depressing film for me. Happiness played by Oscar winner Forest Whitaker from The Last King of Scotland (Widescreen Edition) & Vantage Point (Single-Disc Edition) finds joy just before the bullet enters. This was a depressing flick notable for Brendan Fraser's fine performance and Julie Delphy's beauty. Taxi!
Rating: 
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Excellent Film.
First of all, I bought this movie with Southland Tales because I love Sarah Michelle Gellar. We watched Southland Tales first and then waited a few days before watching The Air I Breathe because we were disappointed in Southland Tales. We should have watched The Air I Breathe first. I just loved it. I read all the reviews before I purchased and was pleasantly surprised. I fully expected just to watch it and not truly enjoy it. I guess I'm not as big of a snob when it comes to films as some people are. Sarah Michelle gives an excellent performance of Sorrow. Forest Whittaker always gives an entertaining performance. I found myself with tears at the end of the film. Definitely worth watching, even if you're only adding to your Sarah Michelle collection.
